15 days in the Balkans - suggestions requested

My wife and I are going to land up in Dubrovnik on 21 April and have to finally fly out of Sofia on 3 May evening. The question is: how to spend the intervening time visiting as many places as possible. Our typical tourism is somewhat different as compared to the usual concept of spending a lot of time in delving deep into the local cultures etc - we prefer to cover as many places as possible in a limited time and budget. What has worked best for us so far has been something like this: stay at a city for 2-4 nights (in Air B&B type accommodation), see the town itself, visit areas by day trips and move on to the next destination.

Some places that have been suggested are Mostar, Sarajevo and Belgrade (we have already been to Ljubljana, Zagreb, Plitvik lakes and the areas in Northern Croatia/Slovenia). We will be using public transports (buses, minibuses etc). Our basic interests are nature, UNESCO sites, Monuments and historical places. We are not the beach type, and museums also generally do not hold so much fascination for us unless they are really of the 'un-missable' kind like the Hermitage, Uffigi Galleries, the Louvre, Prado, Cairo museum etc which we really enjoyed.

RE: 15 days in the Balkans - suggestions requested

I took a bus from Split, Croatia to Mostar and then a train to Sarajevo. I'm like you guys, I don't do the tourist things (in fact you seem to do more than me as I wouldn't even go to the Louvre, but have been to the museum in Cairo).

Mostar is a heritage site. The Mostar bridge is right there, and it's a easy town to walk around in without issues. I wandered all over the city as I like to get away from tourists and see how the real culture is outside of that. I spent a couple of nights there and it was well worth it. I really liked hiking up to a Serbian graveyard and seeing the city from that viewpoint as well.

Sarajevo has a number of things, the tunnel that was used and the old town is pretty cool to see. I've wandered all over this city as well and walked from old town all the way to Vrelo Bosne way to the west. Also walked to across the borders of Srpska in several different spots (though I don't recommend doing it from the south part from Old town. I was threatened by a would be theif in the hills there and encountered groups of younger people who were watching me that made me feel a little concerned (I've walked all over Eastern Europe and this was the first time I was thinking I need to get back to the main part of the city). But the destroyed homes and structures up in this part were a very interesting site as well as all the bullet holes in most the homes.

I can't comment on Serbia yet as I haven't been and only been to Eastern Bulgaria and not to Sofia...

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